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I'm in the process of listening to this great podcast again, and it's weird how on just a different day with more time to between things you completely re-evaluate things.
* For some reason, this time around I would be dead-set for Rob Van Dam on SmackDown. Losing The Rock is a big hit, but he could verbally put over a guy before he left? Did he work the first SmackDown of the brand split? If so, I'd have done The Rock & RVD vs. Kevin Nash & Scott Hall. The nWo were about as good as done, but by putting them with talent they hadn't had much to do with (the Rock/nWo stuff was mainly centred on Hogan/Rock), you instantly make them more interesting. I'd want to keep them away from Hogan and Austin as much as I could. RVD would have had that sort of "cool vibe" that Rock could have gotten behind, and I'd have liked to have seen him on the show where I feel he'd have had smaller shoes to fill, because he was just about ready (in terms of how over he was). Depending on Edge on that show is too much of a climb upwards.
* Austin and Hogan on RAW. Dare I say, I'd have put the Undisputed Title on Austin at Backlash. Yes, Austin was getting past it, but a large part of what fatigued him was creative. Austin just hovering sucked and everybody knew it. If you had treated him more carefully, I think you really could have got him through to the next Mania against Brock. That leads me on to Triple H.
* I know you guys are against hot-shotting the title, but I think Austin beating Triple H, leading to inevitable Austin/nWo interaction on SmackDown (and RVD interaction to put him further over), you could have built tensions there. Triple H could have turned heel (something I agree should have happened) at Judgment Day, where the nWo officially align with him and fuck over Austin. This leads to a Hell in a Cell match (obviously you don't do Trips vs. Jericho), and Austin beats Triple H, possibly when some enemies of the nWo toss them around ringside. You then move onto Austin vs. Rock for Vengeance. It's not WrestleMania, but the match was big enough to draw and it feels like you could have gotten away with it in this era. Rock wins their third PPV headline against each other, and Rock still carries the title into SummerSlam where he puts over Lesnar. Austin vs. Brock is your Mania main event.
* With RVD on SmackDown, I'd have Edge on RAW, where he becomes the first US Champion under Ric Flair. I know you guys swapped Flair and Vince over, but I liked Flair being on RAW -- I found it surprising and I think the roster allocations are more fresh with Vince interacting with the likes of Van Dam, the nWo, etc. and Flair working with Austin and Edge. Flair offers Edge the US Title out the gate, but Edge tells Flair he doesn't want to be handed anything, and he wants to earn it in a tournament. Flair tells Edge he's a "...good kid. A stupid son of a bitch, but a good kid." This very subtle resentment of Edge's hard-working nature leads to Flair eventually putting Edge against The Undertaker -- the man who beat him at WrestleMania. No, the matches wouldn't have been Angle vs. Edge, but they would have felt special and helped Edge get even more over with crowds.
* Angle would be SmackDown for me. Not because of the hindsighty SmackDown Six stuff, but because for some really fucking weird reason, I want to see Angle trying to join the nWo. He was so good at walking the line between credible and goofy, he could have been an ace in the nWo's hat when you need to put them over. Angle could have come out wearing a black t-shirt with nWo-style lettering, excepts the letters are his three I's and they're in red, white and blue. He could have offered Nash, Hall & X-Pac milk in the middle of the ring. That sort of goofy stuff that completely clashes with what the nWo is about, but everybody would know he was good enough to be in there. You could have had them work tag matches, and they make Angle do all the work by refusing to tag in. This might have eventually pushed Angle towards being a face, but it also could have led to Angle being inducted, he kicks out Hall or something (provided the act didn't clean up) and Angle becomes SmackDown's top heel.
* To me, this would mean that Jericho would have to be RAW. I felt these guys were both sort of at the same level at this time. Jericho interacting with Austin was done at No Way Out, but it was still relatively fresh. He could have worked with Edge, or either Eddie Guerrero or Chris Benoit when they were ready to return. I wouldn't have put both Eddie and Benoit on the same show though.
Just some further ideas on the subject. Why not keep the conversation going?
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